Background
The Origin of Raulke
Raulke was given the name “Josiah Devereux” at birth. He was born in the city of Baron to a Black Mage named Teena and her husband, a swordsman named Zarche Devereux. A surly child growing up, he was often teased by his peers because he was so short and skinny. To look at him now one would likely not believe that. The teasing made him withdraw into himself, and he began to take up his father’s swords when Zarche wasn’t looking, playing with them and trying to mimic what he saw his father doing on the practice field. Usually he didn’t have much success, but he was still a small child. His mother was trying to teach little Josiah about black magic, thinking that with his small stature, he would be more suited to magical combat than physical combat, but he didn’t seem to take to it very well. He wasn’t really interested in it; he was more interested in learning to fight with a sword. The inevitable happened, of course, and Zarche caught Josiah playing with the swords, the boy barely able to lift the blade off the ground at twelve years old. To humor the boy, Zarche began to teach him a little about the sword. He was surprised when Josiah actually seemed to absorb the knowledge better than the magic his mother was attempting (and failing) to teach him.
Teenage years are harsh, and teenage peers are even harsher still. Unfortunately, Josiah found this out the hard way. The teasing reached a fever pitch in his early teenage years, though he had filled out some in his early teenage years. He had gained a bit more muscle tone and his body had begun to take on more bulk, but his height was increasing at a rate that forced his musculature to play a frenetic game of catch up that it seemed to be failing at...though this wasn’t what most of the teasing was about. Most of it had to do with his anti-social attitude. Many of his peers thought of him as elitist and snobbish because his parents were well-to-do, and few people went out the effort to make friends or even to talk to him. This wasn’t the case of course--neither he nor his parents were snobbish--and the resultant complex of his grew ever larger with each passing year.
But if he thought his life and times were trying now, he was about to change his mind very quickly. True, his muscle mass was finally beginning to catch up with his height, and he was growing into quite the young heart-throb, so the teasing was beginning to level off. But the next trial would be his greatest. Gradually, the atmosphere of the town of Baron began to change, becoming more militaristic and harsh. Soon, no one was allowed to speak ill of those in the castle, and especially not of the king! Unfortunately, Zarche and Teena didn’t realize they were being overheard when a comment was made about the king’s sudden change in attitude. It was an innocent enough comment: “The king’s not himself lately, is he?” But it sent the castle, and the king, into fits. Immediately, Zarche and Teena were brought in front of the king, tried, and condemned to die for treason. The travesty of a trial was short, presided over by no jury, and the couple was given no chance to defend themselves or explain the comment that had been made. There was nothing Josiah could do, and no one in Baron dared to speak for them, for fear of their own heads joining the couple’s on the chopping block. Josiah himself couldn’t speak out, because he was their son--the king deemed that Josiah would be expected to lie for his parents. The boy could only watch, helpless, while both his parents were convicted of treason and sentenced to be beheaded. Josiah marked that day as the day he ceased to exist as ‘Josiah Devereux’. After his parents’ deaths, he packed a very small bag of things and left the town of Baron, swearing he’d never return so long as he lived.
After the Exile
He wandered around the continent for a long time, barely scraping by. He had taken one of his father’s swords, and was managing quite well, monsters notwithstanding, until he had the misfortune to stumble upon a particularly vicious wild panther. Such encounters with monsters had never truly placed him in any real danger up to this point. While he wasn’t a remarkable fighter, he was a good enough swordsman in his own right that he had little to worry about. But perhaps this panther was hungry, or simply a much more aggressive specimen than the others of its species. Josiah was wounded and forced to flee into the woods; the panther chased after him, hot on his heels. He was fast running out of strength as he tried unsuccessfully to lose the panther in the forest. Just as he’d collapsed upon the ground, almost completely drained of strength and given himself up for dead, he heard a sound...a sound he’d heard before. It was the low swooping sound of a sword being swung, and the distinctive noise a blade makes when it passes through living flesh. A man in dark armor, with a wicked-looking sword, came to his rescue and killed the panther. When the man introduced himself as the Dark Knight Erich Raulke, Josiah was sure his days were at an end. But Erich wasn’t evil or even remotely hostile towards him. That gave Josiah pause. Erich, too, felt that there was more to the unfortunate boy than met the eye. He allowed Josiah to come back to his isolated cabin and there he treated the boy’s wounds. They weren’t severe, but they required that he rest a bit before he continued his journey to wherever it was that he was going.
Josiah stayed for a week, long enough to discover that there was a connection there, a kind of unspoken communication. Perhaps it was because both of them had suffered horrible tragedies that they were still feeling the effects of. Erich’s wounds had long since healed, though they left scars; the wounds of Josiah’s past were still open and fresh. Just as Josiah was about to leave, Erich inquired if he would like to learn the dark sword. Josiah was puzzled. He’d always thought the dark sword was inherently evil, but Erich didn’t seem to share that opinion. To him, the power of the dark sword was just a tool, no better and no worse than the one who wielded it. This explanation seemed to appease Josiah’s concerns, and he agreed to become the Dark Knight Erich’s pupil.
Unfortunately, even then the Mistress of Fate saw fit to deal Josiah another devastating blow. When Josiah was about twenty-three, Erich was killed. Not by a monster, not by another warrior, or even in battle. He was killed by a tree that he had been attempting to fell, for wood to repair the cabin. Josiah gave him a proper burial, putting a simple grave marker there, picked up what few things he had, and left again. As when he left Baron, he had no destination, just wanted to get away from the pain. He took his beloved sensei’s surname as his first name--Raulke--and left his identity of Josiah Devereux back in the past with the rest of his emotions. He no longer goes by the name he used as a child. As far as he’s concerned, “Josiah Devereux” died with his parents.
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